Manicure Monday: Spring Designs

My manicures are my form of art. Whether through colors or designs, manicures are how I express my style or current mood. I’m not impartial when it comes to my manicures, though – I definitely pick favorites. One of my absolute favorites was my galaxy manicure. On the other hand, there are manicures that aren’t on my list of manicures I’d like to recreate. This is one of them. Read on to hear my rant, list of excuses, and reasons why I know this manicure could actually work.

I found this manicure on Pinterest and absolutely fell in love with it. Super cute, right? I had the colors I saw in the photo, I knew how to create the designs, I was good to go. All I would change was switch the star to my ring finger. Except it didn’t come out as good as I planned. Here’s what I used to create the look:

I started with my usual base of Nail Tek II. When I do designs, I like to complete all of my nails first and then go back and add the designs later, so I began adding the base colors one at a time. For the gold glitter nails, I used Color Club’s Disco Nap, which is an amazing gold glitter polish. The glitter is so fine that this is honestly the most opaque glitter nail polish I have ever come across. It’s part of Color Club’s Foiled Collection, so it’s more of a hybrid between a metallic polish and a glitter polish.

All’s good so far! This is where it gets sticky … literally. I used Art Club Nail Art Lacquer in Gold for the gold details. I wanted to use Disco Nap again, but Art Club has a skinny brush that is (typically) good for designs. I created an accent star on my ring finger with no problems. To create the star, draw it out as you would on paper and fill it in. It’s much easier than you’d think!

I used masking tape (Note: I was out of painter’s tape. Masking tape works terribly. Use painter’s tape.) to create the stripes. I left room for two strips of the opposite color on each nail and painted over each nail with the opposite color. Let it dry as much as you can before peeling the tape off.

To pull the look together, outline your newly-painted stripes with your gold glitter. My Art Club Nail Art Lacquer in Gold is probably much older than I should admit, and it got a bit gloppy. This made my stripes messy and thick, while they should have been straight and thin. To be honest, if you replace your polish more than once every five years, you should be fine with creating this manicure.

About Kathleen Tower

Kathleen is the style editor for The Collabor-eight. She's a 23-year-old true Jersey girl; big hair, bigger heart. Her passion for beauty and makeup started with an internship at Seventeen Magazine and has grown ever since. After graduating from Villanova, she turned her love for Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter into a full-time job as a social media coordinator! When she's not at work, she's browsing everywhere from the Internet to the streets for her own "Manicure Monday" inspiration. She believes that true style comes from a mix of high and low, designer and drugstore, expensive splurges and nearly steals!